1. Technical Field
The following description relates to one or more communication systems with a printer being connected to a host device such as a personal computer and workstation.
2. Related Art
When printing is performed based on printing data for printing images and texts transmitted to a printer from a host device such as a personal computer (PC), there is used a network printer system, which is configured to perform a printing operation with communication between the printer and host device in accordance with a protocol of a network via which the printer is connected with the host device (see Japanese Patent Provisional Publication No. HEI 11-296325, hereinafter referred to as '325 Publication). Such a network printer system is advantageous in that one or more printers can easily be shared among a plurality of host devices.
In '325 Publication, there is described a printer system with a printer being connected with host devices and a network server, which use the printer, via an internal network installed in an office or the like. In order for the host device to use the printer via the network, a printer driver for generating and sending printing data is required to be installed into the host device. In general, a printer driver is provided in a form stored in a printer driver disk such as a CD-ROM as a standard attachment at the time of purchase of a printer. In this case, a user has to install the printer driver of the printer to be used into a new host device from a CD-ROM drive provided to the new host device each time the new host device is connected to the network.
In '325 Publication, there is disclosed a technique in which a network server connected with the same internal network is utilized as a providing source of the printer driver. In the above technique, a new printer driver, which has been found through periodical accesses to the network server by the printer, is automatically installed. Thereby, the user is freed from the operation of installing the printer driver, yet the network server has to be provided on the internal network.
In '325 Publication, there is further disclosed a technique in which a printer driver is stored in a printer corresponding to the printer driver. In this case, when a new host device (PC) is connected to the network, the printer driver is downloaded from the printer and installed into the new host device via the internal network. According to the technique, since the printer serves as a network server, a new printer driver can be downloaded without any separate network server provided on the internal network.
However, in '325 Publication, there is not any detailed description about how the printer driver stored in the network server (or the printer as the network sever) can be updated.
Further, according to the technique disclosed in '325 Publication, when a plurality of host devices are connected with the internal network, there might be caused a problem that a printing operation of the printer cannot be performed due to a congested traffic of the internal network in the case where the plurality of host devices concurrently access the printer to download the printer driver.